OAP wife who repeatedly slashed husband with Samurai sword 'had no choice'
An elderly woman who killed her husband by repeatedly slashing him with a Samurai sword, has been deemed unfit to plead.
Joanna Rowland-Stuart, 71, had been deemed 'unfit to plead' to the murder of her husband Andrew, 69, in their 15th-floor flat in Brighton, on May 27 last year. She appeared in front of a jury at Lewes Crown Court for a trial of the act which decides if someone physically committed a crime, rather than their intent.
She told police attending the scene that 'she had no choice' but to kill him, after he attacked her with the sword, which she had bought in the 1980s.
Rowland-Stuart was given an indefinite Hospital Order Under Section 41 of the Mental Health Act 1983.
The case comes in stark contrast to the sentencing of Marcus Arduini Monzo who also used a Samurai sword to kill his victim, 14-year-old schoolboy Daniel Anjorin.
Last month Monzo was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum term of 38 years and 309 days in jail.
The court heard he killed, skinned and deboned his pet cat Wizard before he launched the spree of violence in Hainault, north-east London, on April 30 last year.
During the rampage, he virtually decapitated Daniel and attacked a pedestrian, two police officers and a couple in their own home, jurors heard.
Afterwards, he likened events to Hollywood movie The Hunger Games and claimed to have an alternative personality of a "professional assassin".
He was found guilty by an Old Bailey jury which found Monzo guilty of Daniel's murder, three charges of attempted murder, aggravated burglary and possession of a bladed article relating to a kitchen knife.
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